


how do you fight every second you're alive

by mirkandmidnight



Series: if/then [5]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Ahahahahaha, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Badass Rey, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Help, Pain, Snarky Ben, i hate everything, i'm so far into the au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-21
Updated: 2016-02-21
Packaged: 2018-05-22 11:38:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6077970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mirkandmidnight/pseuds/mirkandmidnight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rey has had enough of this shit.</p>
            </blockquote>





	how do you fight every second you're alive

**Author's Note:**

> My titles continue to be from sad musicals about history. Bonus points if you can tag the song this is from.

Rey was not having a very good day. She had finished training with Luke and come back to the Resistance base, but the First Order was making things difficult for them. More than that, everyone had been acting very strange lately. Jessika had been vague and twitchy, and it was like Poe was moping.

She’d tried to figure out what was going on, but to no avail. No one was telling her anything.

So Rey decided she needed to get off the base for a while. Maybe then people could get their own problems in order and things would go back to normal.

She’d gone to General Organa, asking for a mission to go on, wanting to forget the oddness back at the base. General Organa had given her look and a recon mission to Endor, where it was rumored the First Order was building a stronghold.

Rey took the Millennium Falcon the next day and headed for Endor. It felt good to be flying again, felt like the days when she had just been Rey, not a Jedi, not the face of the Resistance, not the one who everyone was counting on. She could pretend that nothing had changed.

Only things had changed.

She made it to Endor quickly enough and landed in a secluded area, making sure to turn on the camouflage, an addition she’d made recently. 

Rey headed out into the thick woods, unnaturally aware of every gust of wind and every snapping twig. There could be stormtroopers anywhere, and she’d best remember that if she didn’t want to get caught.

As she moved through the trees, Rey reached out with the Force, trying to get a read on just how many people were on Endor. There were quite a few, enough to make her believe the rumors of the First Order building a base on the planet.

Rey frowned. One of the presences felt jarringly familiar, and yet unfamiliar at the same time. It seemed similar to Kylo Ren’s but more balanced, like the Light and Dark had stopped struggling and finally agreed to share living space. It was close by, too, alarmingly close.

Something rustled in the bushes nearby and Rey whipped around, hand going to the hilt of her lightsaber. She saw the size of the bust and relaxed. Nothing larger than a very small animal could be hiding in there. She turned back around and-

“What are you doing?” Kylo Ren asked, looking more confused than she could have thought possible. He wore no helmet, and a fading scar bisected his face. She’d put that there.

Rey definitely reacted in a reasonable and adult-like fashion. She definitely did not let out a yelp of surprise, or immediately call her lightsaber.

That would just be unprofessional.

“What are you doing here?” she shot back, once she had regained some semblance of composure.

“I asked you first,” he countered.

“Well, that’s mature.” Something about this encounter was so surreal. They weren’t fighting, and he wasn’t trying to use mind tricks on her. They were just sniping at each other like ordinary people.

Rey narrowed her eyes. “Shouldn’t we be trying to kill each other or something?”

Ren shrugged. “I mean, we could, but that wouldn’t be a lot of fun, would it?”

She stared at him. What was the matter with this guy? Previously he would have jumped at the chance to fight, to prove that he was the superior one of them. This had to be a trick, some new way of luring her to the Dark Side.

“Don’t you have things to do? Troops to command or something?”

“Yeah...about that.” He scratched at the back of his neck awkwardly and looked at the ground. “See, I sort of defected? So no troops, unfortunately, but I was going to go and break some of the First Order’s stuff. Want to come?”

“Why should I trust you?” Rey asked. 

Ren shrugged. “You probably shouldn't, but I figured you weren't going to let me wreck stuff on my own, and I'm not looking for a fight.”  
“Why should I trust you?” Rey asked.

Ren shrugged. “I mean, you probably shouldn’t. But I figured you weren’t going to let me wreck stuff on my own, and I’m not looking for a fight.”

“You killed Han Solo.”

“And does that make me any less good at breaking stuff?” Kylo Ren pointed out. “I realize that I’m really easy to despise, but if you could maybe put aside your personal prejudices long enough to-”

Rey cut him off with a punch to the nose. His head snapped back and he reached up to touch his nose, fingers coming away red with blood. 

“Huh,” he mused. “Pava doesn’t punch as hard. Maybe you just dislike me more. Understandable.”

She stared at him, hand still clenched in a fist. “You’re not going to, I don’t know, punch me back or something?”

He shrugged. “I could if it would make you feel better. But again, not a lot of fun and, if I’m being honest, more effort than I’m willing to put in at this point.”

Finally Rey regained her composure. “Did you get knocked on the head or something?” she asked.

To her complete and utter shock, he ducked his head and grinned ruefully. “I wish.”

Okay. This was possibly the weirdest thing that had happened to her this month. Rey looked at him suspiciously. Whatever kind of weird trick this was, Rey still had a mission to go on. That said, it might be more impressive if she managed to bring him in.

“Fine,” she said. “Let’s go.” Rey gave him the side eye. “Still don’t trust you, Ren.”

He winced visibly. “Don’t call me that.”

Rey nodded but otherwise kept her silence, and they started out side by side. Okay. This was really freaking weird, but okay.  
***  
So, Rey. Not actually an awful person, as it turned out. She didn’t say anything, but then he supposed that was sort of reasonable. What exactly were they supposed to say to each other? Oh, sorry about that time I sliced your face open. No, not a problem, I’m sorry about the time I forcibly entered your mind and dug through your most personal memories.

Not exactly the most scintillating topics of conversation.

Still, and he never thought he’d say this, but the utter silence was more unnerving than however uncomfortable their conversation could be. He looked at her lightsaber and frowned. He could be wrong, but it looked like there were emitters on both ends.

“You made a quarterstaff?” Ben said before he could stop himself. It wasn’t like he had any right to judge. He’d recently fitted his with two more emitters to make a crossguard. It just didn’t feel right without one. 

She looked at him sharply. “You have a problem with that?”

He held up his hands. “No, just curious. I wasn’t aware that was an option.”

“Lots of things you don’t know.”

“I’d imagine so,” he replied, and they continued walking in an uncomfortable silence. Eventually, irritated beyond belief, Ben stopped walking, Rey following suit soon after.

“Look,” he snapped, “I’m aware that you have problems with me. Hell, I have problems with me. But can you maybe make it a little less obvious? I can’t really concentrate on fighting if I’m worried that you’re going to run me through with that quarterstaff the second I turn my back.”

“Like you did with Han Solo?” Rey said coolly.

He reeled back as if she had slapped him. “Well, that was uncalled for.”

Rey tilted her head. “You don’t have to worry about me backstabbing you,” she said. “I was taught better than that.”

“And the hits just keep coming,” Ben muttered. But then there was no more time for conversation, as they had reached the First Order’s building site.

They had cut down the trees, leaving a huge clearing covered with building materials. Two crews of stormtroopers were currently at work building something in the middle of the man-made clearing.

“That isn’t good,” Rey said, and for once, Ben couldn’t disagree. If the First Order managed to have an outpost on Endor, it would be that much harder to get rid of them. They ducked out of view behind a few trees and held a quick, huddled conference.

“What do we do?” Rey asked, and Ben raised an eyebrow. “Oh, don’t give me that look, we both know you’re got more tactical experience than me.”

Ben shrugged. “Fine. The point is to break as much of their stuff and as many of their machines as possible. We want to discourage them, not murder them.”

Rey nodded. “You go in first, then I’ll cover you.” To the outside observer, it might sound like she trusted him to get the job done. Which, to some extent, she supposed she did. Rey put a lot of stock into the man’s ability to cause utter chaos and wreak havoc. It was just that she would feel a lot more comfortable covering his back than having him cover hers.

Ben nodded, stood up straight, and sprinted towards the construction site, igniting his lightsaber as he went. Rey stared after him for a moment, then ran after him. What was the madman doing? He’d be spotted within seconds.

Ben quickly laid waste to some of the machines littering the clearing, and that was when Rey realized being seen was the point. They were sending a message to the First Order that their progress was being observed. That in mind, Rey let out a ringing war cry and spun her lightsaber in a deadly circle, gutting one of the nearby machines.

Ahead, Ben had finally got the attention of a few stormtroopers and was fending them off nimbly, his dark purple weapon seeming more like an extension of his arm. As she watched he kicked a trooper in the knee and, in the same movement, speared another one through the chest.

“I thought you said no killing!” she yelled. 

“I said try not to, not that it was forbidden!” Ben yelled back.

Rey groaned and continued hacking at machines with her lightsaber. Somehow she didn’t recall Master Luke’s training sessions covering this sort of situation. She had thought this was going to be a simple recon mission, not Destruction 101 With Your Mortal Enemy.

She jogged forward, trying to keep within a reasonable distance of him. They were supposed to be working together, after all.

Ahead, Ben knocked a trooper to the ground and stabbed at a piece of equipment. The trooper started to get up while his back was turned, and for a moment Rey was frozen.

“I’d stay down if I were you,” Ben said, almost conversationally. The trooper continued to rise, but Ben reaching out behind him and twisted his fingers, and the trooper slumped to the ground. 

“Not to worry,” he said, taking another stab at the equipment. “Only unconscious.”

“That’s not very Jedi of you,” Rey said. “I was told not to use the Force as a weapon.”

He huffed out a laugh. “I’m not very Jedi.”

She looked around the clearing. Stormtroopers lay in piles, some groaning and others frighteningly still. The majority of the machinery was a wreck of tangled metal.

“We should probably go before reinforcements arrive,” she stated, and he nodded in agreement. They set off at a jog towards the woods.

“You know,” Ben said conversationally, “that was more fun than I was expecting it to be.” He glanced over at her. “Thanks for not murdering me, I guess.”

Rey snorted. “Only because you’re not worth the trouble.” They reached the surrounding trees and stopped a few paces into the woods. She looked him square in the face. “I do have to bring you back to the Resistance, though,” she said.

Ben stopped short and looked back at her, biting his lip. “Are you sure you want to do that?” he said softly.

She squared her shoulders. “I have to do my duty.”

He nodded. “I understand,” he said, and for a moment Rey thought he was going to come quietly. A mistake on her part, as it turned out.

Then he grinned. “But you’ll have to catch me first,” he said, and took off at a dead sprint through the trees. 

Rey took off in pursuit. Well, tried. Somehow she ended up falling flat on her face. Rey sat up and saw that the laces of her boots had been tied together in a perfect bow. She felt frustration rising as she realized he must have tied the laces together without her noticing, and with the Force no less.

“Damn you!” she called after him, and heard his answering peal of laughter from a considerable distance away. Rey found a smile on her face in spite of herself. She’d never catch him now, not with his head start and stupidly long legs.

Somehow the thought didn’t bother her as much as it should have.  
***  
Rey went back tot he base in considerable better spirits than when she had left it. So of course it couldn’t last long, because that was just the way of things, wasn’t it?

She elbowed Finn. “What’s going on with them?” Next to them Poe and Jessika were eating in dead silence, Poe glaring and Jessika staring determinedly staring down at her plate.

Finn shrugged and reached for a fork. “I dunno. They’ve been like this since you left. I think they had a fight or something.”

Rey looked between the two of them and shook her head. SHe stood, taking her now empty plate with her. “I’m going to see if Leia has another mission for me.”  
***  
Leia did have another mission, thankfully. In fact, Rey had requested a few more after this one was complete, if possible. She would stay away while Poe and Jessika worked out their problems.

Her mission took her near to another First Order stronghold, and once again, Ben was there. We was waiting for her just outside town, leaning casually on the trunk of a tree.

“How did you know i was going to be here?” Rey asked, suspicious.

He looked up. “What makes you think I’m here because of you? I do have my own life, you know.”

She sighed. “Break things?”

He nodded. “Break things.”

“You know,” Rey said as they worked together to destroy a bank of computers, “you’re going to have to teach me that trick with the shoelaces.”

Ben smirked beside her. “Ask General Organa. She taught it to me when I went away.”

“Leia knows the Force?” Rey asked, shocked.

He looked over at her. “Where did you think I got it from?” he asked, sounding genuinely perplexed.

She shrugged. “I don’t know. Han?”

Ben scoffed. “As if that scruffy nerf herder knew anything about the Force.” That sounded more like th Kylo Ren she’d know. The realization was simultaneously reassuring and, if she was honest, a little disappointing.

“Why’d you kill him?” she blurted. A pause followed, and Rey found herself wondering what had possessed her to say that. Was she trying to get herself killed?

He took a step back from the bank of computers, looking thoughtful. Rey tensed up.

“Good question, that. I don’t have a good answer. Also, mind your own business. It’s rude.”

Rey turned away at the harsh rebuke, face stony.

Ben sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. How was it that he constantly screwed up her interpersonal relationships? “Sorry,” he said. “I’m not very good at this.”

She turned back slowly. “I can understand that.” A shot rang out behind them, and before Rey could react, Ben tackled her to the ground as the shot flew over their heads. Ben pulled her to her feet and started sprinting down the corridor, pulling her behind him.

“What’s going on?” she shouted.

“We hung around too long!” he replied. Fortunately, they weren’t too far inside the building, and it wasn’t long before they’d made it outside.

“You know,” Rey commented as they ran through the open field. She risked a look backwards. “I had that covered. You didn’t have to shove me out of the way.”

He laughed, the sound short and harsh. “Oh, yeah. I believe you, he said, his tone indicating anything but. Behind them, a couple of stormtroopers were running out of the base.

“That out to be amusing,” he muttered, picking up the pace. They were almost to the trees. If they could just make it to the trees, they would have decent cover.

They passed the trees just as a hail of blaster shots decimated the ground behind them. To be honest, Rey wasn’t having the best time keeping up with his stupidly long legs. The outline of the Millennium Falcon was suddenly visible through the trees, and Rey changed course to run up the ramp. Then she looked over at him. The stormtroopers were right behind them, there was no way he’d get back to his ship.

Rey groaned. Sometimes she really hated having to be the good one. He was demonstrably a bad person! He’d killed a hell of a lot of people, people she cared about.

“Get in,” she shouted as she ran up the ramp.

“What?” he yelled back.

Rey stopped at the top and waved him towards her. “You heard me, idiot! I’ll drop you off somewhere or something.”

Ben shrugged but ran up the ramp after her, ducking to avoid the shots flying towards them. As soon as he made it to the top, Rey raised the ramp and headed for the cockpit. She slid into the pilot’s chair and started flipping switches.

But Ben shook his head and sat in the copilot’s chair. “That’ll take too long,” he said, a frown on his face. “They’ll be here before then.”

 

“Well, what do you suggest?” Rey snapped.

He bent down and started rooting around underneath the command board. “Get ready to take off,” he warned.

Rey gripped the steering and nodded, and he flipped a switch. They jerked upwards, and she used the boost as momentum for takeoff.

Ben stood up sharply, nearly hitting his head. The ship rocked as she started evasive maneuvers, and he tripped and fell down with a crash. Rey winced, but kept flying. “Get in a seat,” she told him.

He shook his head. “Someone’s got to man the guns and you’re busy.” He got to his feet and headed towards the gunner’s stations. Rey didn’t bother asking if he knew how to operate them. He’d be fine, he’d probably grown up on this ship.

She shoved down the feeling of jealousy and concentrated on flying. The radar showed two or three TIE fighters coming in behind them, which wasn’t good. Rey pulled down the headset and put it on.

There was a crackle of static, but after a moment she could hear Ben on the other end. It was surprising how quickly she’d fallen into calling him by his given name. He wasn’t acting much like Kylo Ren; maybe that was it.

“Last time I do anything nice for the Resistance,” he grumbled. “Do I get a thank you, or any kind of acknowledgement that I’ve been helpful? No, it’s all, “Get on the ship, Ben,” or, “you’re such a disappointment, Ben.” He paused. “Which, probably true.”

“I can hear you,” Rey said dryly, and heard the sound of him firing. A few seconds later, an explosion of flame was visible through the viewport. Rey checked the radar. Only two ships behind them, now.

“You were meant to,” Ben replied, a tad shortly.

He lied.

“That’s what I thought.”

She lied, too.

One of the ships was coming up behind them, and her attention snapped back to the situation at hand. She resumed evasive action, ducking in her seat as she took the ship lower.

“One of them’s coming. Can you see it?” she asked.

There was a pause, during which he presumably looked around. “No,” he eventually said. “Nada. Nothing.”

“What side are you on?” she snapped.

“I’m sorry?”

“Of the ship! What side of the ship are you on?”

 

“Port?”

Rey glanced at the radar, noting the position of the two remaining ships. They were awfully close together. She turned 90 degrees so that he was facing them. “Now?”

The definitive lack of an explosion followed. “The gun’s not working,” came the panicked response.

“Well, fix it!” she shouted.

“I’m doing my best here!” he yelled back. She heard a loud whack through the headset, as if he’d hit the gun out of frustration. A second later, she heard shots being fired. Rey ducked instinctively, half expecting alarm bells to start ringing.

“That better not be my ship being fired at, Solo,” she said tightly.

“Not my name.”

“I don’t care right now, shoot them and then tell me later!” If she died because of his bad aim, Rey was going to murder him herself.

There was dead silence over the headset for a few terrifying seconds. Then she heard a shot, followed by not one but two explosions.

He whooped, sending a crackle of static down the headset.

“What’s going on down there?” Rey asked, trying to be heard over his exhilaration.

“They were so close together that when I hit one, the explosion destroyed the other one two!” he shouted.

Despite herself, Rey found a wild grin spreading over her face. A few minutes later, Ben reappeared in the cockpit. He looked a little banged up, presumable from the bumpy trip down, but there was a jubilant smile on his face. The smile faded when he saw her.

“What now?” he said quietly.

She shook herself. What now? She had to take him back to the Resistance, didn’t she? He was her sworn enemy. Kylo Ren was a threat to the safety of the whole galaxy.

But maybe he wasn’t Kylo Ren anymore. He didn’t answer to his old names, and he certainly wasn’t acting like her enemy. He’d had so many opportunities to get her captured or killed, but he hadn't taken any of them. In fact, he had been actively helping her.

“What do you want to be called?” she asked carefully. His answer would determine his choices. 

He hesitated, and Rey’s grip tightened on her lightsaber. It was a little tight in here. Certainly not ideal conditions for a fight, if it came to that.

“Ben,” he finally said, and her grip relaxed. “Ben Organa.”

“Ben Organa,” she said, a smile on her face. “You know, the Resistance is looking for someone called Kylo Ren. You wouldn’t happen to know him, would you?”

Ben looked suspicious, and she didn’t blame him. “I can’t say I do,” he replied, looking ready to bolt at any second.

“Well then,” Rey continued. “I haven’t got any reason to detain you, it seems. Is there anywhere I can drop you off?”

His mouth hung open. “Are you serious?”

She blinked. “Why would I joke about something like that?”  
***  
When Rey got back the the Resistance base, Finn was there to meet her. He rushed up to her as she stepped out of the Falcon, bouncing up and down on the tips of his toes.

“Have you heard?” he asked. “Someone’s been going around and destroying First Order bases!”

Rey blinked. News had gotten around faster than she’d anticipated. She fell into step beside him and they walked back towards the building. “No, I can’t say I have,” she replied.

“Oh.” Finn sounded almost disappointed. “People were saying you had something to do with it.”

She decided it was time to change the subject. This was getting a little close to lying for her taste. “So, have Poe and Jessika finally made up?”

He nodded. “Yeah, I still don’t know exactly what it was about, though. She locked them into the gym and apparently they boxed.” He shook his head. “Weird. They were talking about some guy named Ben. Poe was really mad, saying she had no right to keep information from him.”

She felt her stomach twist, and started walking faster. Rey needed to talk to Poe.

She found him in the mess hall, staring down at a plate full of food. No one was sitting next to him, which was surprising, given how popular he was. He looked up as Rey slid into the seat across from him.

“How was the recon?” he asked.

Rey tilted her head. “Not so bad,” she replied. “I might have run across an old friend of yours.”

He picked up his spoon and pushed some of the food. Poe looked more dejected than she had ever seen him. “Oh?”

She leaned in closer. “You wouldn’t happen to know someone called Organa, would you?”

Rey grinned as Poe’s brow furrowed. She watched his face pass through the stages of confusion, realization, disbelief, and finally exhilaration.

“That sneaky little bastard,” he breathed. “You’ve seen him?”

She nodded.

Poe stood, leaning on the table, and she followed suit. “Tell me everything.”  
***  
Leia pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed, and Rey found herself staring down at her shoes.

“What’s going on, Rey?” she asked, sounding so much more tired than Rey remembered. With a shock, she realized that Leia was getting old.

Rey didn’t answer.

“Do you know where Kylo Ren is?” she asked, and Rey hesitated. Did she lie? Leia had provided her with so much. But if Ben got brought back to the Resistance now, nobody would benefit from it.

“No,” she finally said. “I don’t know where Kylo Ren is.” And that was sort of true. The man she’d met wasn’t Kylo Ren.

Leia deflated. “I see,” she said. “Thank you. Dismissed.” Rey stood and left the room, turning back as she walked through the door. The general had rested her elbows on the desk and covered her eyes with both hands.

Rey turned and walked away.


End file.
